From the information Ranni had gathered by searching the Finger Mother's soul, everyone learned the greatest secret of the Lands Between-though they invoked the Greater Will all day long and assumed it was the boss around here, it had never interfered in the Lands Between at all. It had all been that little shit, the Finger Mother, borrowing its authority to stir up trouble.
A deathly silence fell over the conference room.
Everyone present was a person of exceptional ability. Godfrey and Marika were a king and a god, yet every last one of them had been blinded to the truth and played like a puppet.
It felt like someone had shoved a mouthful of ancient shit down their throats. They could neither chew it nor swallow it; it just lodged there, making them sick.
Messmer's already pale face went another three shades whiter with rage. He clenched his fists, his knuckles cracking and veins bulging on the backs of his hands, and forced a few words through his teeth. "The Finger Mother... are you certain she's dead?"
His tone plainly said that if she wasn't, he wouldn't mind helping her die a few more times.
Unfortunately, Ranni shook her head. "I dealt with her personally. The Finger Mother never even had a chance to teleport away. She couldn't be any deader."
Messmer heaved a long sigh and tilted his head toward the heavens, the picture of sorrow at a forty-five-degree angle.
The regret on his face was even stronger than when his own mother had abandoned him in the Land of Shadow to fend for himself.
He was a demigod, after all, with an image to maintain. He couldn't accept that some little shit had played him for a fool.
Ordinary people, however, had no such immense burden of